THE  LAYMEN’S  MISSIONARY  MOVEMENT 


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The  Interests  of  the 
Nation  in  the  Missions 
o£  the  Church. 


AN  ADDRESS  BY 


J.  A.  MACDONALD, 

Editor-in-Chief,  The  Globe,  Toronto. 


CANADIAN  COUNCIL 
TORONTO 


The  Laymen’s  Missionary  Movement 


The  Interests  o£  the  Nation 

in  the  Missions  of  the 

Church 


AN  ADDRESS  BY 


J.  A.  MACDONALD 

Editor-in-Chief,  The  Globe, 
Toronto 


Canadian  Council,  Toronto, 


The  Interests  of  the  Nation  in  the 
Missions  of  the  Church. 

By  J.  A.  Macdonald,  Editor-in-Chief, 

The  Globe,  Toronto. 


By  “the  nation”  is  meant  very  concretely  this 
nation  to  which  we  belong,  this  complex  unity  of 
peoples  gathered  together  in  the  north  of  this  great 
continent,  this  Canadian  nation,  which  of  late  years 
and  by  events  beyond  our  reckoning  or  control  has 
been  pushed  out  into  the  limelight  on  the  great 
world-stage,  with  its  new  world-parts  to  play,  its 
new  world-obligations  that  cannot  be  shirked,  its 
new  world-problems  that  will  not  be  put  by.  And 
by  “the  church”  I  mean  that  complex  and  compre¬ 
hensive  body  of  people,  of  whatever  name,  who  be¬ 
lieve  in  Jesus  Christ  as  their  own  and  the  world’s 
Redeemer,  who  profess  allegiance  to  Him  and  who 
are  not  unmindful  of  His  world-wide  programme. 

Now  this  is  my  question:  What  great  interests  of 
this  Canadian  nation  are  involved  and  at  stake  in 
the  undertakings  and  achievements  and  ideals  of  the 
Canadian  Church?  In  raising  this  question  I  should 
like  to  keep  in  mind  those  who,  like  myself,  have  to 
do  day  after  day  chiefly  with  the  business  and  pol¬ 
icies  of  the  state,  with  national  administration  at 
home  and  with  expansion  and  influence  abroad.  I 
should  like  to  help  some  statesmen  to  appreciate 
more  justly  than  is  sometimes  done  something  of 
how  and  to  what  degree  Canadian  democracy  is  de¬ 
pendent  on  the  Canadian  church  not  only  for  its 
vitality  at  home  but  also  for  its  virility  and  pres¬ 
tige  abroad.  And  I  should  like,  too,  to  help  you 
delegates  to  appreciate  the  national  bearing  and 
worth  of  all  those  religious  services  and  all  this 
missionary  endeavor  to  which  here  and  in  your 
home  congregations  you  give  yourselves  with  such 

3 


enthusiasm  and  devotion.  I  would  have  you  feel 
the  throb  of  your  nation’s  life  throughout  the  en¬ 
tire  range  of  your  church  activities.  When  you  go 
back  to  the  routine  of  your  congregation’s  work,  I 
would  have  you  ever  remember  that  what  you  do 
unselfishly  and  without  applause  or  recompense  in 
the  obscurity  of  your  parish  carries  in  its  heart  a 
handful  of  the  life-seed  of  the  nation  and  that  some 
day,  somewhere,  on  some  mountain  top,  the  fruit 
of  that  sowing  shall  shake  like  Uebanon. 

A  moment  ago  I  used  the  word  democracv- — Can¬ 
adian  democracy.  That  great  word  is  full  of  mean¬ 
ing  alike  for  the  nation  and  for  the  church.  It 
means  more  for  the  people  of  this  North  American 
continent  to-day  than  for  any  other  people  in  any 
age  of  the  world’s  history.  It  signifies  the  enfran¬ 
chisement  of  the  crowd,  the  day  of  power  for  the 
average  man.  On  this  continent,  in  the  United 
States  and  in  Canada,  the  seat  of  authority  is  not 
in  the  dictum  of  the  ruler,  but  in  the  will  of  the 
people.  The  compelling  power  behind  Parliament 
is  not  that  which  comes  downward  from  the  crown 
but  that  which  comes  upward  from  the  crowd.  This 
is  the  land  and  this  the  day  of  the  man  in  the 
street.  That  significant  political  fact  means  much 
for  the  church.  It  offers  the  most  splendid  oppor¬ 
tunity  and  involves  the  most  urgent  obligation.  It 
may  be  that  under  monarchy  the  government  of  a 
city  or  of  a  country  might  grow  corrupt  and  sink 
into  decay  and  yet  the  church  be  free  from  blame, 
but  if  in  any  city  or  nation  where  the  people  rule 
there  flourish  political  crime  and  unabashed  public 
evil,  the  church  cannot  be  held  guiltless,  for  in  the 
democracy  the  church  has  its  supreme  chance. 

The  two  great  organs  of  the  democracy  are  the 
state  and  the  church.  Democracy  has  many  other 
organs — the  press,  school,  social  and  industrial  or¬ 
ganizations,  benevolent  societies,  clubs,  unions, 
leagues,  associations  of  all  sorts.  These  all,  in  sc 

4 


far  as  they  educate  and  mould  opinion  among 
their  members  and  direct  or  enrich  the  life  of  the 
community,  are  organs  of  the  democracy.  Indeed, 
it  often  happens  that  these  secondary  and  voluntary 
institutions  in  the  democracy  create  and  organize 
public  opinion  on  great  questions  which  ultimately 
find  their  way  into  Parliament  and  there  are  regis¬ 
tered  as  the  will  of  the  people. 

It  remains  true,  however,  that  the  state  and  the 
church  are  the  two  chief  organs  of  the  democracy. 
They  are  the  most  important  because  they  are  the 
most  representative  and  most  truly  democratic. 
They  come  nearer  to  the  people.  They  speak  for  the 
people  and  to  the  people  with  more  undisputed  au¬ 
thority.  ICach  has  its  own  sphere.  Their  functions 
are  distinct.  They  act  and  react  on  each  other.  If 
either  fails  the  other  suffers  loss.  If  churchmen  hold 
back  from  their  duty  as  citizens  of  the  state  they 
sow  seeds  of  evil  for  their  church.  If  citizens  di¬ 
vorce  the  state  from  the  ideals  and  obligations  of 
religion,  tares  and  dragon’s  teeth  will  spring  up  for 
the  nation. 

Let  us  now  think  for  a  little  about  some  of  the 
great  national  interests  which  must  be  conserved 
and  safeguarded,  if  the  nation  itself  is  to  come  to 
its  own  and  to  endure.  And  let  us  see,  as  we  pass 
along,  how  the  guarding  of  these  national  interests 
is  at  once  the  great  opportunity  and  the  inescap¬ 
able  obligation  of  the  church: 

National  Ideals. 

i.  The  nation  cannot  retain  unimpaired  its  own 
strength  or  secure  to  its  own  citizens  either  true 
happiness  or  real  liberty,  unless  the  atmosphere  of 
its  life  is  kept  pure  and  its  ideals  of  nationhood 
high.  Like  the  individual,  the  nation  lives  by  an 
invisible  flame  within.  If  that  flame  burns  low  in 
the  fogs  of  national  selfishness  or  goes  out  in  the 
darkness  of  sensual  indulgence,  no  wealth  of  mater- 

5 


ial  resources  or  external  pomp  and  pride  of  power 
can  save  the  nation  from  inevitable  and  utter  decay. 

Unless  there  be  integrity  and  purity  in  all  the  re¬ 
lations  of  life,  unless  the  home  is  kept  sacred  as  the 
citadel  of  the  nation,  unless  family  life  and  social 
ties  are  sanctified,  unless  there  is  awakened  and 
made  strong  a  community  of  interest  and  of  feeling 
between  class  and  class  in  the  industrial  world,  un¬ 
less  honesty  is  maintained  in  trade  and  patriotism 
in  politics,  the  nation  cannot  be  held  together  ex¬ 
cept  by  the  corroding  lust  for  gain  or  for  power 
which  eats  away  the  fiber  of  national  character  and 
poisons  the  blood  of  national  life. 

And  it  is  at  once  the  opportunity  and  the  respon¬ 
sibility  of  the  church  so  to  relate  itself  to  the  Can¬ 
adian  situation  as  to  be  a  savor  of  life  unto  life  for 
the  nation.  There  is  no  substitute  for  the  church 
as  the  moral  leader  of  democracy  on  this  continent. 
Think  of  the  church’s  equipment:  its  agencies  every¬ 
where,  its  message  to  the  heart  and  conscience  of 
the  individual,  its  ideal  a  regenerated  social  order, 
its  emphasis  on  moral  distinctions,  'moral  obliga¬ 
tions  and  moral  retributions,  its  motive  the  re¬ 
demptive  power  and  constraining  love  of  a  Divine 
Personality.  What  is  there,  what  could  there  be,  so 
equipped  for  service  and  so  set  at  the  strategic 
points  as  is  the  church  in  Canada  to-day? 

Of  course  the  church  has  its  limitations,  but  they 
are  the  limitations  of  its  human  environments  and 
human  instruments,  not  of  its  genius  or  ideal.  Of 
course  the  church  makes  mistakes,  is  sometimes 
narrow  in  its  vision  and  warped  in  its  judgment 
and  stinted  in  its  service.  Of  course  it  sometimes 
misplaces  the  emphasis,  misconceives  its  own  func¬ 
tion,  and  plays  at  precedence  with  the  state  when 
it  should  be  out  in  the  great  world  of  struggle  and 
high  endeavor.  But  when  the  worst  is  said  it  will 
still  be  true  that  more  than  any  other  agency  or  in¬ 
stitution  the  Canadian  church  stands  as  the  bul- 

6 


wark  of  what  is  most  worth  while,  and  the  inspira¬ 
tion  and  the  agent  of  what  is  most  worth  doing, 
in  the  abounding  life  of  this  Canadian  nation. 

World-Wide  National  Obligations. 

2.  If  this  Canadian  nation  would  indeed  be  great 
among  the  nations  of  the  world  its  citizens  must 
cherish  supremely  a  sense  of  obligation  for  the  en¬ 
lightenment  and  uplift  of  mankind,  and  for  the 
peace  and  higher  civilization  of  the  world;  and  it  is 
the  business  of  the  church  to  teach  that  essential 
lesson  and  to  lead  the  way. 

We  hear  on  all  sides,  and  in  some  quarters  with 
growing  emphasis,  the  cry  “Canada  for  the  Cana¬ 
dians.”  On  the  other  side  of  the  line  it  is  “Amer¬ 
ica  for  the  Americans.”  Very  good,  and  very  im¬ 
pressive.  But  who  gave  the  present  generation  of 
people  in  Canada  and  the  United  States  the  title 
deed  to  this  continent?  By  what  authority  can  our 
seven  millions  and  their  seventy  millions  divide  su¬ 
premacy  over  this  western  world,  over  its  land, 
over  its  natural  resources,  over  its  trade?  Who  are 
we,  holding  as  we  do  for  but  a  brief  moment  our 
places  and  doing  as  best  we  may  our  day’s  work — 
who  are  we  that  we  should  say  to  all  the  world, 
“Hands  off!”  Is  it  by  the  accident  of  present  occu¬ 
pation,  or  by  the  fact  of  last  century’s  conquest,  or 
by  the  boast  of  this  century’s  power?  Let  history 
tell  us  whether  by  titles  such  as  these  any  nation 
has  held  its  own.  Let  events  on  these  lakes  and 
lands  now  called  America  tell  us  if  mere  occupation 
or  mere  conquest  or  mere  display  of  power  is  a 
title  deed  inalienable  in  the  arbitraments  of  war. 

No;  we  must  learn  as  nations  what  the  church 
teaches  us  as  individuals,  that  no  gift  or  opportun¬ 
ity  or  resource  is  ours  for  our  own  sakes  or  selfish 
uses  alone.  This  continent  with  its  riches  is  no 
more  an  unassailable  heritage  of  the  present  gener¬ 
ation  that  occupy  and  use  it  than  it  was  of  the  In¬ 
i’  7 


dians  or  the  mound-builders  who  were  displaced  and 
driven  back  with  each  rising  tide  of  new  civiliza¬ 
tion.  World-service  is  the  only  tide  by  which  in  a 
world  like  ours  this  claim  of  supremacy  can  be 
other  than  a  mocking  echo  of  our  own  selfishness 
and  folly. 

And  within  the  two  great  nations,  holding  this 
continent,  a  great  new  thing  may  even  yet  be  done 
for  mankind.  It  is  not  too  late  but  that  democracy 
might  have  a  new  chance  to  make  good  what  was 
only  dreamed  in  ancient  Greece  and  missed  in  the 
French  Republic.  In  the  wholesomeness  of  our  so¬ 
cial  life,  in  our  industrial  brotherhood,  in  the  hon¬ 
esty  of  our  trade  and  the  integrity  of  our  politics 
and  the  idealism  of  our  nationhood,  democracy  in 
America  may  strike  out  for  some  new  and  noble 
thing  and  may  present  to  the  world  a  realized  ex¬ 
ample  on  the  plain  of  the  nations  of  what  Jesus 
meant  by  the  true  greatness  in  life  when  he  said: 
“Whosoever  would  be  first  among  you,  shall  be 
your  servant.” 

The  Standard  of  National  Righteousness. 

3.  True  greatness  for  the  Canadian  nation  re¬ 
quires  that  truth  and  honor  and  justice  shall  char¬ 
acterize  all  the  relations  of  this  nation  with  the  out¬ 
side  world  and  especially  with  the  nations  of  the 
Orient  and  with  the  heathen  and  pagan  lands.  And 
the  maintenance  of  this  standard  of  national  right¬ 
eousness  is  involved  in  the  church’s  devotion  to  the 
enterprises  of  foreign  missions. 

Of  all  the  uncivilized  remainders  of  life  in  our 
Christian  civilization  this  is  perhaps  the  largest, 
that  having  outgrown  the  suspicions  of  savagery  as 
between  individuals  we  still  cherish  the  pagan  and 
barbaric  idea  that  other  nations  must  be  our  enem¬ 
ies,  and  our  prosperity  dependent  upon  their  embar¬ 
rassment.  We  have  come  to  apply  the  Ten  Com¬ 
mandments  to  our  social  and  business  life,  but  in 

8 


our  dealings  with  other  nations  we  readily  discount 
the  Decalogue  and  regard  as  chimerical  in  the  realm 
of  international  politics  the  Master’s  command  : 
“Love  one  another.’’  But  there  can  be  no  national 
greatness  on  any  basis  that  would  make  greatness 
for  the  individual  impossible.  “Noblesse  oblige”  is 
for  the  nation  as  truly  as  for  the  man.  And  the 
nations  of  this  continent  must  learn  more  per¬ 
fectly  the  lesson  of  the  Great  Life. 

And  the  church  by  its  unselfish  services  to  “the 
regions  beyond”  leads  the  way  for  the  nation,  and 
the  reflex  of  that  missionary  service  will  make  de¬ 
finitely  for  honesty  in  the  trade  and  integrity  in  the 
treaty  regulations  between  this  country  and  the  na¬ 
tions  of  the  non-Christian  world.  The  men  in  the 
churches  of  America  cannot  go  on  forever  giving  of 
their  wealth  and  of  their  blood  for  the  redemption 
of  Africa  and  of  Japan  and  of  China  and  of  India, 
and  then  stand  idly  by  to  see  their  work  undone  and 
their  sacrifice  turned  to  shame  by  the  accursed 
opium  trade  and  rum  trade  and  slave  trade,  or  by 
the  legalized  or  unlegalized  dishonesty  of  our  com¬ 
merce  or  the  chicanery  of  our  political  relations. 
The  going  of  influential  laymen  from  the  churches 
of  Canada  and  the  United  States  and  Great  Britain 
on  tours  of  investigation  among  the  great  mission 
fields  of  the  heathen  world  will  awaken  echoes  in 
our  Boards  of  Trade  and  will  have  its  effect  on  the 
legislation  at  Ottawa  and  Washington  and  London. 

World  Neighborhood  and  World 
Brotherhood. 

4.  In  this  crisis-time  among  the  nations  on  the 
Pacific,  the  century  of  service  by  the  missionaries  of 
the  church  will  mean  more  for  North  America  than 
would  a  standing  army  or  a  costly  navy. 

It  is  true,  as  Mr.  EJlis  said  recently,  that  “there 
is  something  doing”  among  the  nations  of  the 

9 


world.  The  strategic  points  are  now  on  the  Pacific 
and  the  storm  centres  have  shifted  from  the  Medi¬ 
terranean  and  the  Atlantic  to  the  shores  of  the  erst¬ 
while  sleepy  East.  There  never  could  have  been  iso¬ 
lation  for  Canada,  being  as  she  is  the  halfway 
house  of  a  world-wide  empire.  And  never  again  can 
there  be  isolation  for  the  United  States.  Canada 
and  the  United  States  now  are  in  world-politics  and 
must  remain  there  forever.  There  can  be  no  going 
back.  Chance  happenings  which  were  not  on  their 
programme  but  which  were  brought  to  pass  in  the 
increasing  purpose  running  through  the  ages  give 
these  nations  world-wide  obligations  which  cannot 
any  more  be  obscured  or  put  away.  Without  ventur¬ 
ing  on  the  disputed  ground  of  United  States  politics 
of  imperialism,  I  for  one  cannot  repine  over  the  ob¬ 
vious  and  meaningful  fact  that  Britain,  who  for  too 
long  has  had  to  carry  the  burden  of  Anglo-Saxon 
civilization  almost  alone,  has  now  at  her  side  this 
strong-armed  and  brave-hearted  republic  loyal  to 
the  same  ideals  of  humanity  and  dominated  by  the 
same  faith  in  God  that  sent  the  leaderless  legion 
from  zone  to  zone  with  the  flag  of  freedom  and  the 
cross  of  service. 

And  now,  almost  in  the  twinkling  of  an  eye,  the 
whole  world  situation  is  changed.  There  are  no 
longer  any  “foreign  countries.”  By  our  transcon¬ 
tinental  railway  systems  and  our  transoceanic 

steamship  services  we  have  made  the  whole  world 
a  neighborhood.  Biit  nearness  of  touch  and  ready 
exchange  of  speech  and  of  goods  have  not  changed 
the  hearts  of  men  or  made  brethren  of  those  who 
by  race  and  tradition  have  been  aliens  and  enemies. 
World-neighborhood  without  world-brotherhood 
means  war,  and  such  a  war  as  might  one  day  be  on 
the  Pacific  would  mean  hell — hell  for  the  w'orld. 

The  supreme  purpose  of  Christian  missions  for  a 
whole  century  has  been  the  brotherhood  of  all  men 
under  the  fatherhood  of  God  through  the  redemp- 


I  o 


live  love  and  sacrificial  service  of  Jesus  Christ,  fo 
make  that  dream  come  true  would  be  to  turn  the 
Armageddon  of  the  world  into  the  peace  and  good¬ 
will  foretold  in  the  Bethlehem  song. 

The  Path  to  World-Peace. 

5.  The  securing  and  maintaining  of  peace  among 
the  nations,  especially  between  the  West  and  Hast, 
depends  not  so  much  on  trade  regulations  and 
treaty  rights  as  on  the  dominance  of  common  ideals 
and  the  vitalizing  touch  of  a  common  life.  Tariff 
walls  and  exclusion  laws  as  between  America  and 
the  Orient  may  be  necessary  in  the  exigencies  of  our 
industries  and  politics,  but  they  do  not  make  for 
brotherhood  and  peace.  They  may  be  necessary,  but 
that  necessity  of  the  state  makes  still  more  urgent 
and  compelling  the  obligation  resting  upon  the 
church,  as  the  other  great  organ  of  our  democracy, 
to  go  through  those  walls  and  overleap  those  laws, 
and  to  create  in  Japan  and  China  and  India  centres 
of  interest  and  thought  and  life  that  will  under¬ 
stand  and  appreciate  things  in  the  Canadian  and 
United  States  situation  that  are  deeper  than  tariffs 
or  trade.  Channels  must  be  opened  through  which 
the  faith  and  love  and  truth  that  have  made  us  free 
may  pass  unchecked  to  them,  and  from  them  may 
come  in  return  their  great  contribution  to  the  new 
age’s  interpretation  of  the  mysteries  of  the  Chris¬ 
tianity  of  Jesus  Christ.  Faith  alone  goes  deep  en¬ 
ough  into  life  to  give  that  touch  that  makes  all 
men  kin.  Our  forms  of  civil  government  will  not  fit 
the  genius  of  the  Orient,  and  our  religious  creeds 
will  not  express  the  faith  that  is  in  Christ  as  it 
comes  to  them,  but  the  Christ  in  whom  we  believe 
is  larger  than  our  understandings  of  him,  and  when 
he  becomes  incarnated  again  in  the  life  of  the  Orient 
there  will  come  a  depth  and  richness  to  our  gospel 
such  as  will  give  a  new  significance  to  his  world¬ 
mastering  evangel. 


The  missionaries  of  the  church  have  indeed  been 
the  pioneers  and  first  ambassadors  of  the  nation. 
Not  for  conquest,  not  for  commerce,  but  for  the 
world’s  redemption  they 

“Yearned  beyond  the  skyline, 

Where  the  strange  roads  go  down.” 

By  the  blood  of  their  martyrs  the  ways  of  civiliza¬ 
tion  were  blazed  the  world  around.  By  their  gospel 
of  love  and  service,  not  in  Asia  alone,  but  in  Eu¬ 
rope,  in  Britain,  in  America,  a  nation  is  born  in  a 
day.  And  this  new  birth  of  Christian  nations  into 
a  life  of  world-service  means  a  new  brotherhood  of 
world-peace  into  which  the  nations  of  the  world 
shall  bring  their  glory  and  honor.  To  help  on  that 
redemption  of  our  national  ideals  at  home  and  that 
evangelization  of  heathen  nations  abroad  is  the  su¬ 
preme  purpose  of  this  daymen’s  Movement  for  mis¬ 
sions  among  the  churches  of  this  continent.  And 
that  is  A  MAN’S  JOB. 


M 

f*-- .  ...  ?  7  ■  ■  .*>  "  •  > 


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